There’s always a sense of excitement when we drive into a town and find a vibrant and diverse community filled with people and beautiful, occupied storefronts. Too frequently, though, we find the opposite: no people and empty, decrepit storefronts. We then comment, “Geez, this town has seen better days.” And we drive right through, unlikely to return. It’s too bad because with vibrant towns, we stop, get out, open our wallets and keep going back.
The root causes of town distress can fill many, many books, but I’ll generalize: empty storefronts signal something is wrong. In some cases, the causes are macro and out of the control of the town or business owners. Examples include cyclical economic downturns, commerce redirection because of new highways and shopping centers, or broad changes to the industrial or manufacturing base. In the sixties, we tried to counter these macro issues with urban renewal, which yielded questionable results.
In other cases, empty storefronts are a result of micro conditions because business owners fail to adapt. Why?
- They lose the concept of customer service
- They underestimate the need to market themselves
- They shun advances in technology
- They don’t collaborate with each other
These are self-inflicted wounds that happen more frequently than they should. It’s a shame. The core issue is that we shouldn’t be seeing so many empty storefronts, at least not the ones that can be controlled. It’s bad for the towns, the business owners, and the customers. People want to get out of their cars when they drive into a town; they want to stroll the streets; and they want to spend their money. Over the coming months, I’ll examine each of these issues, with the goal of providing some guidance on what small businesses can do in our evolving world. Perhaps the towns or chambers of commerce can take a cue as well.
Rob Ciampa
Photo Credit: George Cannon
During a recent drive through my hometown, I noticed that my junior high school (or middle school in today’s vernacular) had been replaced by an entirely new building. I was rather surprised because the old structure was built like a tank. Curious, I asked some of my local friends why the old school was razed. “We needed an elementary school.” “Asbestos.” “Needed a new roof.” “It was old.” “Was time for a better learning environment.” The last one caught me because I’ve heard that issue in many towns in which I lived.
In 2004, at a local bookstore in Atlanta, I came across a book called 
As marketers and business leaders, we spend years, if not a lifetime, cultivating our brands. They define who we are and generate an annuity of business and goodwill for decades. That annuity helps grow the value our brand equity. Our customers, by purchase and by proxy, derive benefit from our brands. Go walk into a 
Facebook 
What a difference a year makes. Last year, our large Thanksgiving gathering was still divided and at odds over the then recent 2008 presidential election. With the exception of Sarah Palin, which I’ll address shortly, a new, shiny object showed up with the holiday turkey: social media. With three generations at the table ranging from ages twelve to eighty, I knew it was going to be an interesting discussion. For my statistically-oriented and pollster-pushing friends, here is a measurable tidbit: everyone in attendance had an email address – and that included “the elders.” For simplicity, let’s segment the gathering into the elders (60 +), the kids (20 -) and the mid-market (20-60).
Shitwork
I’m starting to wonder whether an old house is a metaphor for business. Strike the “old” – maybe any house is a metaphor for business. How so?
So what’s “shitwork”? Many contemporary definitions (yes, I’m not kidding) define it as something that’s given: trivial, unrewarding, tedious, dirty, and disagreeable chores. I’m going to modify the definition to something that’s received: subpar, shoddy, goods or services that have long-term, negative economic impact.
So what does this have to do with a house? Ask most homeowners about the quality of their houses – especially the things they had to fix – and they’ll tell you about shitwork, without my fancy definition. Let’s look at this more closely.
When I moved to Atlanta several years ago to start a company, I bought a beautiful, well-known-architect-designed home. It was stunning. Within 18 months, all the rooms had to be redone because every square foot of drywall had bulges and cracks from nail pops. The builders didn’t use drywall screws; they used nails, which can’t stay in place as a house naturally contracts and expands. That’s shitwork. I had to redo every wall and ceiling.
Back up North and now living in a 100-year-old Massachusetts home, I had a water pipe let go. Upon inspection, it became clear that a plumber, ten years ago during a renovation, failed to put the new copper piping fully in a coupling before soldering the joint. That’s shitwork. I spent a weekend cleaning it up and fixing it right.
What about business? No different. As part of a marketing campaign, I hired a firm to do a promotion from one of their “highly-targeted” lists. Though we received a respectable number of leads, our conversion rates were zero. Yes, nada. Nil. I never had this happen before and upon investigation discovered that the vendor didn’t even bother to filter their list based on our criteria. They figured we wouldn’t notice. That’s shitwork. Fortunately, we caught this in time and didn’t pay them.
We can only wonder about the economic (and even environmental) impact of shitwork. Too bad the financial benefit is on the bad vendor or the unethical contractor, but only if they can get away with it. Social media and services such as Angie’s List help, but we still have a long way to go. We’re all busy people, but we can only mitigate the risk if we inspect the work, document it well, and keep a zero-tolerance policy. Whether it’s our home or our business, shitwork is shitwork.
Rob Ciampa